Global General
Unpaid Somali soldiers desert to insurgency
(Agencies)
Updated: 2010-04-28 10:10
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"There is not enough money to pay everyone," Col. Ali Hassan said as a group of officers listened, then added hastily: "But we are happy there is some money."
Earlier this year, trainee soldiers had their guns confiscated and replaced with sticks after a riot broke out between those who had been paid and those who had not. The African Union, which has peacekeepers at Camp Jazira, temporarily suspended payments over fears that men who had been paid would be killed by those who had not, an official involved with the training said.
Soldiers also had problems with some battalion-level commanders stealing their rations, a European official said. The US has sent a shipment of food this month to try to help the malnourished soldiers regain their strength, he added.
Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
Siyad, the defense minister, said the US was currently funding the salaries of around 1,800 Somali soldiers, and another 3,300 soldiers were being paid by other donors. However, that is only about half the 10,000 troops allowed under the peace agreement that formed the coalition government.
Other countries have contributed to training programs for security forces, notably France and Germany. A German-funded training course for 900 Somali police recently ended in Ethiopia, a Western official in Nairobi said, but there are fears the trainees will desert because no provision has been made for their salaries.
Some international payments are channeled through a fund administered by PricewaterhouseCoopers, an arrangement designed to prevent the mass theft of salaries and combat a desertion rate of up to 90 percent that scuttled a previous U.N. effort to reform the police force.
However, diplomats complain the lists of soldiers the government has provided differ from those they have been authorized to pay. Officers including Gen. Ahamad Buraale, who is in charge of Camp Jazira, also say PricewaterhouseCoopers has been slow to issue the identity cards that allow soldiers to be paid.
The firm declined to comment, citing a confidentiality agreement with its clients.
Siyad said it is vital that the 2,000 Somali soldiers slated to undergo six months of training in Uganda be paid. The European Union will take the lead in training, while the US has pledged to pay the salaries of graduates until January, said Patrick Geyson, a political adviser to the EU program.
"Both the police and soldiers need to feed their families," Geyson said. "They need to be paid every month. Otherwise they have to find other solutions."
Guaranteeing longer-term wages for the soldiers may be difficult. Many donors are reluctant to contribute money to an army once notorious for crimes such as rape, kidnapping and murder.
The new army commander is seen by international officials as a vast improvement over the previous one, a warlord who used the army as a clan militia to extort money from civilians. But donors remain wary.
In the meantime, the Somali government is forced to rely on donor nations that are often slow to pay, undercutting soldiers' confidence in regular paychecks, and feeding desertions and corruption. There are few signs Somalia's government will ever be able to deliver social services, shape military strategy and pay its army on its own.
Siyad said the success of the multimillion-dollar training programs funded by American and European taxpayers is completely dependent on being able to pay the graduates.
"If this is not done, then we shouldn't even start. Otherwise the soldiers will just join the opposition," he said.
